


Placing Bets and Burying hatchets

by Pinkycat413



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:34:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24484396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pinkycat413/pseuds/Pinkycat413
Summary: Dualscar and Dolorosa are moirails, and The Signless wasnt having none of that. He and Dualscar place a bet on who can survive better in the wild woods and whoever wins, has to either leave the other alone for good, or has to get to know each other better. which to the signless, was worth than his death.
Relationships: Orphaner Dualscar/The Signless | The Sufferer, The Dolorosa/Orphaner Dualscar
Collections: Ancestor Exchange 2020





	Placing Bets and Burying hatchets

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Miss_Claws](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miss_Claws/gifts).



> not my best work but i had to rush it a little to get it out in time for the deadline of the Ancestor exchange. regardless, i hope the person likes nonetheless!

You don’t remember how long you’ve been dead, a sweep, a hundred sweeps, they all seem to blend together in a blur, at least with these memories you have your family together with you, Mituna just took a lot longer to get here than the others but it doesn’t matter now, you’re all here and you’re all safe and sound. Well... it would be better if a certain seadweller wasn’t around. 

Yes, apparently the Young Orphaner Dualscar has inserted himself into your life and your family’s life with the oh so obvious lie that he, of all trolls, were moirails with your mother, Dolorosa. The same woman that found you as a tiny helpless grub with no lusus in sight, raised you, fed you, literally made the clothes on your back, gave you shelter, and risked her life trying to protect you, a mutant, but you know she would do it all over again if she could. You love this woman with all of your pusher and if it wasn’t for her you wouldn’t have been alive to tell your tale. So how dare this highblood, this seadweller, to have the audacity to say he was in anyway shape or form in a quadrant with your precious mom!? The nerve, his kind has hunted down your people for generations, and when you were alive you’ve heard many a rumor and gossip about this troll. Many were contradictory you find, like him being extremely tall and bulky, he was actually kinda small and lean, kinda disappointing to you for some reason. Other rumors were true, like he was admittedly a very good singer, and that he wasn’t much of a smiler. Other rumors aren’t quite known, since he died before he could even confirm if these were true or not, like how he got his scars, or if he really did die by telling a very bad joke to the Grand fucking Highblood of all trolls. You honestly have no idea and right you don’t really care, you just want him gone. You thought your mom was going to turn him away or turn him into sushi with her chainsaw but you were shocked that she hugged him and was excited to see were quadrantmate here and that her your friends were so accepting of all of this. You were dumbfounded! You felt betrayed! How could she stoop so low as to be in a quadrant with a highblood, after everything they’ve been through together. Insulting. You’ve been sulking and avoiding the two of them for the past few weeks (or what felt like weeks) every time you see them cuddling together, laughing about whatever, or her having his head on her lap, you felt sick. You hated seeing them together, it's like a slap in the face to everything you’ve worked for, to everything you’ve built up in life. You finally decide to get out of hiding and confront both your mom and that seadweller and demand answers. 

You enter the huge tent of your long past childhood and you see them sitting together in a pile braiding each other’s hair. You roll your eyes at the sight and waltz over to them. You very obviously clear your throat to get their attention and they look up at you. “Ashton!” Your mother says, “where have you’ve been sweetheart? We were worried about you.” You roll your eyes once again and squat down to get to their level. “Mother, the only troll you should be worrying about isn’t me.” “What do you mean?” “I mean you should be worrying about yourself! Mom, why him!? Why did you choose him out of every troll you could’ve have as a moirail you chose the very same species that put you and everyone like into slavery, that has culled an entire bloodline into extinction, that discriminate against us, abuse us, and hate us!? How could you love someone like him?” You point a finger towards him and he looks away in a mix of shame, guilt, and probably embarrassment. Rosa looks away from your probably very intense and disappointed gaze. She inhales and exhales heavily and stands up with you. “Ashton, I understand and know where you’re coming from. Trust me I do, you’re right about what the seadwellers did to our kind, and highbloods in general. Even I couldn’t understand or really wanted to fall for him at first.” She looks to him solemnly and he gives a small smile to her “But with Dual- I mean, Dorian, he was different. He felt pity on us lowbloods and did everything in his power to help us from the sidelines. When you... were executed, he found me on the docks, ready to be shipped off to gods know where, he stopped the auctioneer and said he’ll buy me for millions in gold. He recognized me from the stories fellow highbloods and crewmates have heard about us. Ash, he bought me my freedom, sheltered me, and provided for me. I’m telling you that he’s not as bad as you think he is, and if you two were to just talk it out and get to know each other, you’ll see what I mean.” You’re taken aback for a bit, ‘get to know him?’ ‘not as bad as he seems?’ Bah! Never. “No thank you.” “Ashton you need to stop being so stubborn, you’ve been nothing but cold to this man and h-” “This man has probably killed thousands of lowbloods! I’m not going to give him the satisfaction of him putting me into a vulnerable position and adding me unto his list of victims!” “Ashton!” “Rosa! If... If I may speak.” You both turn towards the small seadweller, he’s looking down but finally looks up at you both with a serious but calm look. 

“Signless, I understand your reservations with me and, in turn, with my kind.” He sighs “I’ve seen many of the atrocities my kind has put your people through, many times I couldn’t stop even if I wanted to. And believe me I wanted to. You don’t have to like me, or even trust me fully, or... or even forgive me for not protecting your mother better.” He looks away from the both of you. His voice starting to waver. “I... I just wanted to let you know that I’ve changed a lot since I was alive, and I want to not only, hopefully, create a relationship with you but to also bury this supposed hatchet of ours and put the past behind us.” You’re silent for a bit, but before you can speak again, your mother speaks up. “I think this is the perfect time to announce to you my plan.” What? Announce? What is she talking about? “What do you mean?” “Dorian and I have been discussing some things amongst ourselves and about your attitude towards him and we’ve come up with a plan. I’ve decided we should go on a sort of therapeutic retreat into the forest and spend a few days with nature and perhaps get to, maybe, talk about your feelings with one another?” “Nope.” “Ashton!” “Nah uh, I’m not gonna waste my time with this anymore, I’m gonna have ‘Tuna over there and blast this fish bastard into smithereens!” “Ash!” “Signless, wait!” You turn towards him quickly; you practically tower over him with your much larger build but it doesn’t seem to faze him. “What if we made a bet?” “A bet?” “Yes, it could be whatever conditions you want, anything you want.” “Anything?” “Yes! I’m willing to do anything to make some sort of connection with you and to make my Rosie happy.” You scowl at him and lean down to his level. “Fine, you’re a seadweller right? So, you must know your way around a ship, know how to navigate vast bodies of water, and since we’re going camping on land, I bet you couldn’t past the first night, and when you eventually will cave and beg us to go home, you’ll leave me and my Rosa alone, and break off your sham of a “relationship.”” “Deal.” Dolorosa gasps and grabs Dualscar’s arm. “Dorian!” “Hear me out, I’ll take you up on your bet, but, if I do make it past the first night you have to promise to make a connection with me and end this freud once a for all.” Your hesitant for a bit, but you smile really wide and extend your hand towards him. “Okay, deal!” You know in your mind that he would lose, you’ve grew up in the wilderness, adapting to it, know all its ins and outs, while this fish bastard grew up in a mansion surrounded by the help, probably doesn’t even know how to even dress himself let alone make a fire, build a shelter, or hell, what to pack. After the bet was made you all settle in for the rest of the night and wait for the next nightfall to officially start. 

You rise, bright and early, you exit the cave to see the former orphaner standing in front of the entrance of the camp, fully dressed and ready to go. He waves at you with a perky, albeit mostly cheeky, smile. You roll your eyes and scoff. You both wait for Rosa to get ready and when she emerges from the cave you see her struggling with some supplies, you both hurry over to help her and you beat the the orphaner to her and you give him a snarky toothy grin. “Need some help there mom?” You say. “Oh, why thank you hon.” “No problem.” You look back at the seadweller expecting a reaction of some kind but he looks like he doesn’t seem to mind or he doesn’t get angry or upset like you thought he would? Either he shrugs his shoulders and moves on. Which ticks you off a little to be honest. You’re trying to one up this guy, winning the bet means he’ll leave you and your mother alone forever, so why wasn’t he showing much of an effort to win her affection? Is he really that confident in himself he’ll win this bet? No, you weren't going to give him the satisfaction. You start your journey off without a hitch, it was kinda hot in the dream bubbles today but that was no problem for you, you were used to the heat, you grew up in very humid areas before and in a dessert at some point so you were doing fine. The Orphaner on the other hand was fanning himself like crazy with Rosa helping him cool off, ha. Despite the lower body temp, anything above 50 degrees for a seadweller will get them sweating up a storm. He was starting to get exhausted by midnight and you all decide to rest for a few minutes at the halfway point of the hike. He douses himself in water trying to cool off, you smirk at him and say, “Had enough fish breath? If this is all too much for you it won’t hurt to just turn back and call it quits. I’m sure what little pride you have left will still be intact once you get back.” You laugh a little while Dolorosa gives a disappointed look. Dualscar sort of glares at you and finally gets up from the ground. He sternly says “We’re not done just yet. We still ‘ave a ways to go till we get to the campsite so let's just go. Don’t have time to stand around, now don’t we?” You fold your arms but whatever, you still have the rest of the night to humiliate him. So you trudge on. 

On the way to the campsite you encounter a variety of plants of creatures that was familiar and not so familiar to you, you give credit where credit is due, Dualscar really was a good shot, nearly got eaten on more than one occasion on the way, Alternia wild life was and is truly, well wild. By 4am you all finally make it to the campsite and exhausted, scraped, sweaty, and kinda bloodied, you all collapse onto the ground fully wreaked with pain from all the walking and dodging of teeth and claws. After a few moments of silence, you can hear the Orphaner giggle. What the hell?! You get up and get in his face asking what was so funny. After a few seconds he says, “I survived.” After a moment your eyes go wide, oh no. You realize you lost the bet. He survived the trip and made it to the campsite in one piece. You lay back down with your face in your hands and groan loudly and deeply. Rosa puts your head on her lap and tells you that you did a great job getting here in one piece and for being a good sport today. Whatever, at least it's not his head in her lap, you’ll take whatever little victory you can get today. A deal is a deal however and so you have to admit defeat, you all get up and you shake his hand and in a defeated tone you tell him that you’ll promise to get to know him and that he can stay as Rosa’s moirail. He laughs some more and tells you that getting to know him won’t be so bad and that you even have some stuff in common. You sigh heavily, you hope it won’t be too bad or else you’ll have to suffer through endless hair braiding sessions and sewing tips, all things you had to go through growing up with Rosa. So I guess with consolation perhaps it won’t be as bad as you thought.


End file.
